


Awry

by Kalael



Category: Subarashiki Kono Sekai | The World Ends With You
Genre: M/M, One-Sided Attraction
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-07-30
Updated: 2014-10-28
Packaged: 2018-02-11 01:12:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,072
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2047506
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kalael/pseuds/Kalael
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Grudges are heavy things, tightly clinging to the insides of ribcages and threatening to crush the heart with it's weight.</p><p>Joshua had often wondered if making Neku forget would be easier than waiting for Neku to forgive him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Grudges are heavy things, tightly clinging to the insides of ribcages and threatening to crush the heart with it's weight. Some seep like poison through the veins and violate every crevasse of the body, until even fingertips are shaking with rage. Only forgiveness can heal those wounds. Only forgetting can make the scars vanish, even superficially.

Joshua had often wondered if making Neku forget would be easier than waiting for Neku to forgive him. But all good things are worth the wait, and erasing those memories would be a cheap victory. Besides, Joshua did find some sick pleasure in Neku's anger. The fact that Neku felt anything at all towards him was enough to keep Joshua at bay. For now.

After the game had finally ended, Neku had seemed to have to terms with everything Joshua had done. For his part, Joshua waited a few weeks before revealing himself to his former proxy. Well, maybe ‘weeks’ was an understatement. ‘Months’ was more accurate, being just shy of a year. There had been quite of bit of damage control to deal with, and a lot of that was Joshua's own fault. Destroying Shibuya would have been easier than the arduous process of healing the damn city, but Joshua had found that he'd been compromised. Betrayed by his own emotions, really. Such a shame. The city would have looked beautiful in shambles around his feet.

(And he would be lying if he said he didn't think Neku would look just as darling curled against his patent leather shoes, but Joshua was very good at lying and he was more than happy to pretend that thought wasn't his own)

His reappearance had shocked Neku and his friends, whom Joshua held little affection for and knew the feeling was mutual. Neku had been speechless, at first, but the nasty punch that he landed on Joshua's jaw had bruised his admittedly frail RG form. Things hadn't been civil, though Joshua did find it a bit funny that Neku was so offended by Joshua's absence.

"I have a job, you know. A job that you so happily ensured I would be continuing. If you had just followed through with my plans, this could have been avoided." Joshua had told him, using the sing song voice that he knew Neku hated. It had been the wrong thing to say, which Joshua knew, but the angry flush that rose to Neku's cheeks had been satisfying.

Neku's kindness wasn't something Joshua really wanted. Although forgiveness would make things easier, he didn't want Neku to treat him the way he did Shiki, or even Sanae. He wanted Neku to act the way they did when they'd been partners, sullen and confused and stubbornly insisting that he was independent despite the fact that Neku was actually entirely reliant on Joshua.

"You're kind of a sick bastard." Sanae told him. It was late in the evening and they were in the UG, Joshua's real form glowing faintly as the sun set on CAT Street.

"That's not the first time you've said that, and it won't be the last." Joshua said, amused. He'd been watching Neku walk home from Beat and Rhyme's place, ensuring the boy didn't meet with any of the Noise that were milling about. Neku's Imagination had only grown stronger through the Game, and while the Noise weren't able to attack those in the RG, there had been a few recent rogues that defied the norm and put those like Neku at risk.

"I doubt Phones would take too kindly to your obsession with him. Or your unhealthy desire to make him completely dependent on you. He's still very much a self-sufficient kid, even after all these years." Sanae never knew exactly how to approach the topic, and Joshua found it funny that even years later the Producer still voiced his concerns.

"Yes...he's turning twenty soon, isn't he. Amazing how he hasn't left Shibuya for more than a few days at a time. He's very attached to my city." He didn’t bother to hide his pleased grin. Neku walked into the apartment building he was living in, and Joshua watched the door until it fully closed before he gave his full attention to the man beside him.

"That's partly your fault." Sanae said softly, his words accusing though there was more resignation than bite. "You're treading on very thin ice by messing with his music like that."

"I only fine tuned it. He was already synched to Shibuya, I just made it a little stronger." Joshua shrugged. It wasn't even a lie, it was just that the reasoning was already entirely selfish.

"And by extension tying his to yours. This is dangerous business. You know there are others who would hurt him if they realized it, and others still who would have you removed from your position. You're both at risk for erasure." It went without saying that the Angels would be a problem in the future. There were laws about this kind of thing, it was just that Joshua chose to ignore them. He smiled thinly at Sanae.

"You worry too much. Neku hasn't drawn the attention of any other Composers out there, and for the most part the Reapers are too stupid to notice him. And he can handle himself, anyway. He just won't realize that until after he comes running to me for help."

"So you're planning on him being attacked?" Sanae snorted. 

"He's not in any serious danger. And should he die, he'll just come back into our care." Joshua glanced up at Neku's bedroom window just in time to see the light go on. Neku was so predictable sometimes. The boy would never admit it but he had a routine, one that Joshua liked to interrupt at the worst of times. He debated causing a power outage when Sanae got his attention.

"You aren't going to make him play again, are you? He's meant to Ascend." The Angels would see to that, Sanae's tone had implied. It wasn't that Sanae disliked Neku, or really even objected to Joshua's recklessness when it came to him. But facts were facts. Joshua inclined his head, still looking up at Neku's window.

"Oh, neither of those things will happen. I'm confident that he'll be persuaded to take on the Conductor's position."

"You realize that he's not going to be the most able Conductor if he dies of old age."

Joshua just smiled, and that alone sent chills down Sanae's spine. 

“Don’t worry about it.”

Sanae did his best not to.


	2. Chapter 2

Even the best laid plans go awry. Joshua found himself sitting on the small balcony of the flat that Neku shared with a roommate who was rarely home. A drink sat in front of him, ice long melted in the muggy summer evening. Shibuya was never silent, the sound of cars and people intertwining with the city’s own music, the notes that only Joshua could hear.

“I imagine that I hear it, sometimes.” Neku said softly. He was leaning against the railing, silhouetted by the sun, his face cast in shadow. It felt ominous.

“I’m sure you would be able to hear it in the UG, with your power.” Joshua told him, completely without sarcasm.

“Maybe. I bet it’s beautiful.” There was a sort of wistfulness inNeku’s voice, and something under Joshua’s skin responded to that, aching and clawing to get out as if there was anything Joshua could to do to fulfill that wish. He could let Neku hear it, could easily push Neku right off that railing and into the alley five stories below. It would look like suicide. It would be easy. Then Neku could listen to the music all he wanted, part of Shibuya’s song for eternity.

“It’s the reason I wanted to become the Composer.” Joshua admitted. Neku inclined his head towards him, curious, but Joshua didn’t elaborate. “I didn’t expect you to call me out here.”

“Honestly, I didn’t think I ever would.”

“It must be a very special occasion, then--”

“I forgive you.” Neku interrupted, nearly breathless. His entire body swayed as if the three words had winded him. Joshua was speechless.

“I have to admit, I...was not expecting that.” He hadn’t been. Not in this world, not in any of them. Not this soon, if ever.

“I know. I spoke with Sanae a few days ago, actually. He mentioned that the Noise have been in the RG more, and I thought...well, I haven’t been attacked. So you’ve obviously been doing something about that, and I just-- you know I trust you.”

“You really, really shouldn’t.” The sun was right behind Neku’s head, haloing him, and even with the backlighting Neku’s face shone bright. It would have been so easy to push him. Joshua stayed seated, his hands clasped loosely in his lap.

“Well, I’m not dead yet.” There was something in Neku’s smile that made Joshua’s stomach twist, something melancholy and gentle that was entirely different from the way Neku smiled at Shiki. “I never understood before, but...humans really are fragile.”

“They are. _You_ are.”

“I know.” They didn’t say anything else, but Neku took the glass that Joshua hadn't touched and drank it all.

 

Despite the fact that he had finally received Neku’s forgiveness, Joshua still felt cheated. The admission had completely blindsided him, and although he enjoyed that this man could surprise him like no other human could, it felt almost...out of place. Maybe Neku hadn’t meant it. Maybe it was just a ploy.

When he spoke to Sanae about it later, the Producer just gave him an odd look that seemed a lot like pity.

“Maybe it’s because you haven’t forgiven _yourself_.”

Suddenly, things made a lot more sense.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Neku interlude.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw: suicidal ideation

Neku knew there wasn’t much time. Human life was so brief, in the grand scheme of things, and wasn’t it funny that it took dying for him to appreciate that? It had been a few years since then, since the gunshot to the head that left him stranded with amnesia in some insane otherworld. Sometimes he wished that he’d dreamt it up, a feverish hallucination brought on by illness, but the existence of his friends blew that right out of the water. The fact that he had friends was enough to make one wonder if this wasn’t a dream as well, though.

Joshua was a frustrating constant. Even before the Composer had deigned Neku worthy of his time there’d been fucking months of wondering where Joshua was, if he’d been erased, if he’d lost interest in Neku now that he was no longer the proxy. Joshua never really left his mind. Neku felt as though a part of himself had been irreparably damaged, like there was a crack within his Soul, and Joshua had somehow settled in the fractures.

He thought he would never forgive Joshua, but life certainly put shit into perspective, didn’t it? Neku couldn’t lie to himself after all this time. He was terrified.

He had seen the way Joshua looked at him as they sat on the balcony. It wasn’t a homicidal look, nothing so dramatic, but as Neku turned his back on the sun he knew that Josh had been thinking of pushing him. It would have been poetic, in a way. Soaring to the asphalt below, wind whistling, then the painful crunch of death. And then what? Music, Joshua’s eyes had told him. Shibuya.

The Game.

Neku was fairly convinced there would only be silence for him now. He was standing on the balcony, alone, the sun having gone down long ago. The alley below him was empty and really, it was prime real estate for a dead body. Not as picturesque as splaying out in a bloody pool by the CAT mural, but good enough.

He could taste the air. The weight of himself against gravity, the wind in his hair, the starry night sky getting further away the closer he got to the ground. He’d stare at the sky as he fell and the last thing he’d see would be those bright fucking stars, his fingers grasping uselessly at the tiny pricks of light.

Neku stayed on the balcony, white knuckled grip on the railing. He didn’t need to end it now. It would all be over soon enough. He stood alone and strained to hear the music, the steady thumping pulse of Shibuya, and found only silence.


End file.
